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0 pointsapendleton9y ago0 comments

USB is a good counterexample, though. They started pushing USB for all peripherals before anybody else, and before there was a good market for peripherals that supported it. The market emerged soon thereafter, though, and other companies were ditching their parallel ports, etc., within a year or two.

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slg9y ago

Except USB was a standard. Lightning isn't and it doesn't appear that the W1 chip is either.

apendletonOP9y ago

Right, I'm not defending this decision, specifically. Just offering a counterpoint to the parent's:

> the biggest difference is that those technologies were all on the downward slope of their popularity when Apple made the move

This was not the case when Apple pushed hard on USB as compared to other peripheral standards with the iMac in the late '90s.

jakobegger9y ago

They say that the Airpods work with Macs too, so I assume they use bluetooth? W1 could just be their custom Bluetooth chip

thesimon9y ago

But they probably can't be paired with any other device than Apple's.

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strictnein9y ago

USB isn't a good counter example, unless they were switching to USB-C. But they're not, they're sticking with their proprietary port.

BurningFrog9y ago

OP is talking about the controversial original iMac launch in 1998:

http://www.macworld.com/article/1133334/original_imac.html

"Considering all these amenities, the most shocking part of the iMac isn’t what it offers, but what it lacks. The iMac has no floppy drive, which might be forgivable if there were a Zip drive or other removable-media option, but there isn’t.

And most dramatically, this new consumer offering has no SCSI port, no standard serial ports, and no ADB ports. Apple has opted to replace these familiar connections with USB, a high-speed serial architecture that has suffered from slow adoption on the Wintel platform despite its technical advantages (see the sidebar “USB: Ready for Prime Time?”). Currently, no USB devices exist for the Mac."

strictnein9y ago

But that was a standard open to all and everyone understood it was the future, even in 1998. Lightning isn't any of that.

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slg9y ago

Except USB was a standard. Lightning isn't and it doesn't appear that the W1 chip is either.

apendletonOP9y ago

Right, I'm not defending this decision, specifically. Just offering a counterpoint to the parent's:

> the biggest difference is that those technologies were all on the downward slope of their popularity when Apple made the move

This was not the case when Apple pushed hard on USB as compared to other peripheral standards with the iMac in the late '90s.

jakobegger9y ago

They say that the Airpods work with Macs too, so I assume they use bluetooth? W1 could just be their custom Bluetooth chip

thesimon9y ago

But they probably can't be paired with any other device than Apple's.

1 more reply

strictnein9y ago

USB isn't a good counter example, unless they were switching to USB-C. But they're not, they're sticking with their proprietary port.

BurningFrog9y ago

OP is talking about the controversial original iMac launch in 1998:

http://www.macworld.com/article/1133334/original_imac.html

strictnein9y ago

But that was a standard open to all and everyone understood it was the future, even in 1998. Lightning isn't any of that.

2 more replies

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse